Grammar detail: あげる, くれる, もらう

あげる, くれる, もらう - giving and receiving

My current mastery of this grammar point:

In Japanese, three main verbs are used to indicate giving and receiving: あげる, くれる and もらう. These are 'directional' verbs: when to use which verb is dependent on who performs the action, and who receives the result of the action. もらう means 'receive', and あげる and くれる both mean 'give', but with different implications about who is doing the giving. It is important to be able to distinguish which verb to use when, as in many cases the subject is omitted.

あげる

あげる is used when the giving is done by the speaker or someone/something the speaker represents or is associated with (family, workplace, sporting team, etc).

カバンをあげた。
I gave her a bag.

In the case where both a subject (giver) and recipient (of the gift) are included in the sentence, the recipient is marked with に:

は

にカバンをあげた。
I gave her a bag.

あげる can also be used to express a situation in which the speaker describes a third-person giving something and the speaker has no association with the recipient. Therefore the very same sentence カバンをあげた can mean 'He gave her a bag'. Of course, in cases where the subject has been omitted, we can assume the subject has already been established.

くれる

くれる which also means 'to give', is used by the speaker to describe the giving action of another person to the speaker or somebody of close association to the speaker.

このチョコレートをくれた。
She gave me these chocolates.

In the case where the subject and recipient are included in the sentence, the recipient is marked with に:

は

にこのチョコレートをくれた。
She gave me these chocolates.

The following is an example of when くれる is used for 'give' when describing something that was given to somebody who is of close association to the speaker. あげる would never be used in this kind of situation.

の

が

に

をくれた。
Our neighbor gave our daughter a book.

もらう

もらう means 'receive' or 'get'. This verb is concerned with the receiving direction, so it is straightforward in comparison to あげる and くれる. It is used to describe 'receive' when the speaker or somebody who is of close association are the recipients.

に

をもらった。
I got an umbrella from my friend.

もらう is also used when speaking about a third-person recipient:

いとこは

しんゆう

親友

にプレゼントをもらった。
My cousin got a present from his best friend.

However, note that もらう can not be used if the giver is the speaker. It would be incorrect to say for example いとこは私にプレゼントをもらった (my cousin got a present from me). To express this idea, you would make the speaker the subject and use あげる, i.e.: いとこにプレゼントをあげた。

Notice that the particle に is used to indicate the person from whom the gift was received. You may also encounter the use of から in place of に - they are interchangeable when もらう is used to talk about receiving items, gifts, etc.